Abstract
During the early twentieth century – when the United States was receiving an influx of non-English-speaking immigrants, and “standardization” was a dominant, yet polarizing, concept – having a single national language that unified Americans became a controversial topic in public discourse. In The Odyssey of a Nice Girl, Ruth Suckow, like many authors at the time, used immigrant language as a foil for midwestern speech to demonstrate its “standard” Americanness. But, as this essay will show, by using other regional American dialects in a similar manner, she questioned how “Americanness” was being understood and recognized during this period in the United States.
Highlights
During the early twentieth century – when the United States was receiving an influx of non-Englishspeaking immigrants, and “standardization” was a dominant, yet polarizing, concept – having a single national language that unified Americans became a controversial topic in public discourse
In opening The Odyssey of a Nice Girl with this episode of linguistic discomfort, Suckow showcases issues of linguistic diversity and corresponding familial politics that spoke to the broader linguistic situation in the United States in the s
In a Republic, where the operations of Government are the result of the combined opinions of its citizens, it is important that the people at large should possess, enlightened, but similar views of the public interest; and it is not, of more consequence that information should be generally disseminated, than that the avenues to it should be common, a statement that deftly defends excluding non-English-speaking Americans from access to governmental policies by emphasizing the United States’ democratic inclusivity
Summary
During the early twentieth century – when the United States was receiving an influx of non-Englishspeaking immigrants, and “standardization” was a dominant, yet polarizing, concept – having a single national language that unified Americans became a controversial topic in public discourse. Just two generations removed from these native German speakers, speaks unaccented English and does not understand German She is uncomfortable in this rural environment, disliking everything from the carefully prepared dinner to the dusty barn she used to enjoy exploring as a younger child, and she does not feel that she has anything in common with her German relatives. This opening scene is brief, and after the family leaves the farm early – at Marjorie’s provocation – and goes back to their slightly more metropolitan midwestern hometown, Marjorie’s German grandparents are quickly left behind, forgotten amongst the other adventures and challenges Marjorie faces as she grows up. Proposals to publish federal laws and documents in both English and German, which was the most widely spoken minority language in the United States in the late eighteenth century, were brought to Congress as early as the s
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